After helping Rkard find a good hiding place, Sadira climbed a quarter of the way around the crater. When she came to a place where the outside slope fell away in a sheer drop, she stopped. This would be a good place to wait. She could jump behind the crater rim to shelter herself from Rajaat’s magic, while her ebon-skinned body would not be harmed by the plunge to the sharp rocks below.
Rajaat’s flashing crown appeared above the opposite rim, filling the cauldron with echoes of crackling lightning. The entire basin shook with the power of his thunderous bellows. The ancient sorcerer started to climb, and frothing floodwaters began to whirl around the base of the crater.
Sadira turned a palm toward the ground, summoning the power to cast a normal spell. As the energy flowed into her body, she pulled a stick of incense from her pocket and watched Rajaat’s head appear above the far crest. His vaporish skin hung from his face in billowing folds, with dark creases that gave him a fierce and sinister appearance. From the size of his eyes and the diameter of his crown, she guessed the ancient sorcerer was about the size of a giant.
Sadira waited until Rajaat had stepped onto the crest of the ridge, then she pointed the incense at him and uttered her incantation. The end of the stick flared and started to burn. As the smoke rose into the air, plumes of steam began to trail off the ancient sorcerer’s misty flesh. Long gashes and round holes quickly opened, exposing the yellowed bones beneath.
Rajaat waved a wispy claw over his body and muttered a counterspell. The incense in Sadira’s hand went out, and the steam stopped rising from the wounds on his body. The ancient sorcerer stepped into the crater. When his feet slipped on the slick sides, he spread his arms and floated down the steep slope like fog. He never took his eyes off Sadira.
“I created sorcery,” Rajaat hissed, stepping across the basin. “How can you think your pitiful skills a match for mine?”
Rajaat pointed a curved talon at her head. Sadira spun away, confident her plan would work as she intended. Another step forward would bring her foe into perfect position for Rkard’s spell.
A string of mystic syllables rumbled from Rajaat’s mouth. The throbbing roar of a mighty whirlwind howled over the basin, and a spout of dark clouds shot from the ancient sorcerer’s finger. It streaked toward Sadira, hurling lightning and pounding columns of water at her side of the crater.
The sorceress jumped off the cliff. The spinning winds hit behind her, ripping the rim into an explosion of broken rock. The storm caught Sadira before she hit the ground and lifted her into a swirling tempest of boulders and water. Lightning bolts stabbed at her from every direction. When they struck, they did not die away but crackled over her body in an endless loop. She was quickly enclosed in a sizzling cage of energy, which flashed twice around the whirlwind and disappeared into the dark clouds. The cyclone sped out across the flooded plain.
A quarter of the way around the crater, Rkard peered over the Dark Lens and watched the storm disappear. His breath came in gasps, and his heart was pounding so hard his chest hurt, but he forced himself to stay calm and concentrate on what he had to do.
Rkard turned his gaze into the crater, where Rajaat’s cloud-wrapped figure stood in the middle of the basin. The ancient sorcerer’s shadow lay against the western rim, looking distinctly insignificant. Resisting the temptation to attack-and not at all certain he was doing the right thing-the young mul waited. He did not take his eyes off his target for even an instant and hardly dared to blink.
Sadira had said that Rajaat would chase her and that Rkard should not cast his spell until the ancient sorcerer’s silhouette fell across the bottom of the crater. It was the shadow they wanted to destroy, not the cloud body.
Rajaat did not go after Sadira. Instead, he remained in the crater, pulling blue clouds out of the sky and using them to patch his wounds. Rkard watched with an open mouth, more in wonder than fear.
The ancient sorcerer continued to heal himself for several moments, stopping only when he had covered all the holes on his body. Rkard braced himself for the attack, ready to call on the sun’s power as soon as his foe moved to follow Sadira. Rajaat did not cooperate. Not even glancing toward the distant cyclone, the sorcerer ran his gaze over the interior of the crater, searching for the Dark Lens.
Rkard touched his hand to the sun-mark on his forehead, not trusting the strange blue orb in the sky to supply the magic he needed. He considered casting his spell at that moment, before his enemy’s glowing eyes could fall on the Lens. Then he remembered what Sadira had told him about how the sorcerer-kings had imprisoned the cloud, only to be attacked by the shadow a few moments later.
“Rajaat isn’t like us. He doesn’t give form to his shadow,” she had said. “It shapes him.”
Rkard studied his foe’s shadow more carefully. From the other side of the Dark Lens, he could angle his spell to strike the silhouette where it lay now. Hoping this small change wouldn’t ruin Sadira’s plan but seeing no other way to do as she had instructed, he crawled across the hot surface of the Lens to the other side. He would have gone around the bottom of the orb, but it was so big that he would not have been able to see Rajaat-and no matter what happened, he was determined not to take his eyes off his prey.
Rajaat locked his eyes onto Rkard’s face and stepped toward him. Although the boy could still see most of Rajaat’s shadow, one flank and part of a leg were hidden behind the sorcerer’s body.
“Give me my Lens, filthy child,” Rajaat growled. He gestured at the Dark Lens with a clawed finger.
The young mul pressed his palm to the warm obsidian and cast his sun-spell. Rajaat’s eyes flared white, though the boy could not say whether it was with alarm or anger, then a ruby light flared deep inside the orb.
Rkard did not expect what happened next. The Lens flashed scarlet, then searing red flames spread over the surface. The boy cried out in alarm and backed away as the Dark Lens erupted into a miniature version of the crimson sun.
Neeva heard a booming voice from inside the crater. “I created sorcery,” it said. “How can you think your pitiful skills a match for mine?”
The warrior looked up. From her hiding place on the uphill side of a boulder, she could see both Sadira and her son. The sorceress stood on top of a small cliff, about a quarter of the way around the crater rim from where Rkard hid with the Dark Lens. Neeva could not see the speaker, though she felt certain from what she had heard that it was Rajaat.
A string of mystic syllables rumbled from inside the crater, then Neeva heard the throbbing roar of a whirlwind. Sadira jumped off the cliff. Her feet had barely left the rim before a dark cyclone ripped it apart. A ball of lightning formed around the sorceress as the spinning winds swallowed her up, then the storm raced away over the flooded plain.
“No!” Neeva gasped.
The warrior pushed herself up, bracing her back against the boulder. The effort of standing made her cold legs ache to the bone, while the small of her back felt like someone had plunged a burning dagger into it. Still, Neeva was thankful that she could stand at all. When her son had cast his healing spell on her at sunrise, it had taken a long time for the feeling to return below her waist, and she had begun to fear that her injuries were too serious for him to repair.
Leaning against the boulder, Neeva turned to watch the cyclone, hoping to see what became of Sadira. Instead, she saw a gaunt and bedraggled figure pulling himself from the floodwaters. Even from twenty paces away, she could see that he had a hooked nose and a long braid of gray hair.
“Tithian!” she hissed.
The king looked up the hill toward Rkard, whose attention was raptly fixed on the crater basin. Not even pausing to gather his breath, Tithian rose and started up the slope on trembling legs.